Flame
by dakeyras
Summary: Naruto and Sasuke are stuck waiting for a reply to take back as part of a courier mission. The Land of Wind is much too hot in the summer, and there's nothing at all to do. Then again, maybe they'll think of something... Set some time after the end of the main Naruto story, but before the epilogue. Slash counterpart to 'Heat'.


Naruto stretched out on the sofa, kicking his shoes into the corner and putting his feet up. His jacket was in a pile on the floor.

"Move, idiot," Sasuke said. Naruto groaned and shuffled into a sitting position, and his team-mate sprawled down next to him.

"I'm bored," Naruto whined. "Why do we have to wait _two whole days_ for the return message? I'm never doing a courier mission again, and especially not to the Land of Wind."

Sasuke ignored him.

"There's nothing at all to do. I've already caught up on my sleep, and we still have to wait, that's how boring this is."

Sasuke fished a bottle out of his travelling bag and took a swig. It burned on the way down.

"I mean, why do- Is that rice wine?" Naruto suddenly perked up. Sasuke wordlessly passed him the bottle, letting his head fall back onto the sofa.

As Naruto grabbed two cups from the small kitchen in their hotel room, Sasuke sighed. "There's no places to train, either."

Naruto poured out two generous measures of the rice wine. "Even if there were, it's much too hot. Well, here's to getting back to Konoha soon." They clinked the cups together and then downed them.

Sasuke shook his head, feeling his slightly damp hair fly about his face. That was much stronger than he'd expected. Naruto also looked a bit spaced out as he stared at his empty cup, and a rosy flush spread across his face.

"Haven't you been to equally hot and boring places when you were travelling with Jiraiya?" Sasuke asked.

Naruto shook his head. "He always made sure there'd be somewhere I could train and somewhere he could be a pervert. Well, except for the few times he tried to get me to come peeking with him."

Sasuke giggled, the sound high and unfamiliar, and poured out some more rice wine. "Here's to Jiraiya," he toasted. The second cup went down easier than the first.

"May he look down on us from wherever he is," Naruto agreed. "Although he's probably looking down at a women's hot spring, if anything."

"Did Jiraiya get you to join him, ever?"

"Well, there was one time... or maybe two... It just doesn't do anything for me, you know. Breasts are nice and all but if I'm at a hot spring anyway, I'd rather just go in myself. Wash up, maybe enjoy a massage" Naruto looked thoughtful for a moment. "I guess I really am a respectable, responsible Hokage candidate now. Who'd have thought?"

"I've actually peeked at the men's baths before," Sasuke said. "Ino dragged me to a hole she'd found in the outer wall of the men's area of this hot spring. It was surprising how much we could see. We were both drunk, but we didn't stay long. But I promised I wouldn't tell anyone, so you've got to keep it secret!"

Naruto grinned. "I wouldn't want to get on Ino's bad side, that's for sure. But _you_ , going peeking? Now that's pretty funny. I thought all those stories about you letting your wild side out when you're off your face were exaggerated, to be honest, but it seems like they might be true after all."

"I blame Kakashi's influence for the way we turned out. Anyway, this is much too warm for me," Sasuke said. A moment later, his T-shirt joined Naruto's jacket. He stretched his arms over his head, enjoying the slightly cooler air on his bare chest. "It's gonna keep getting worse until the afternoon, and I don't want all my clothes to end up too sweaty."

Naruto plucked at his T-shirt. "This is already ruined, but my trousers are mostly fine."

"Might as well take them off too, then. It's nothing I haven't seen before in training, after all."

Naruto shrugged and stripped his trousers off. The room was slightly more bearable with his legs exposed to the air, but his shirt still clung to him. He wiped the sweat out of his eyes.

"I still miss Jiraiya, you know. He taught me so much. And, believe it or not, his writing was surprisingly good."

"He was so damn proud of his books, it was hilarious," Sasuke said, giggling again. He poked Naruto in the side. "Orochimaru had a full collection, and one time when Jiraiya tracked him down, he burnt them in front of him."

"That would have driven him absolutely crazy. He treated his books like the children he never had. In fact, one time–"

"I've heard this story before," Sasuke interrupted. Naruto stuck his tongue out at him.

"I used to think he was a weird old dude who slept with prostitutes all the time, but he was actually really smooth and very successful with women, you know?" Naruto said.

Sasuke snorted. "Even when he was that old? I don't believe it."

"He tried to teach me his 'secret sage techniques' once, but I wasn't very good at it. He made it work for himself somehow, but whatever the magic ingredient was, I never picked it up. Not that I tried that hard – he was a very unique person, and I wouldn't want to be _that_ similar to him."

Sakura turned to face him. "Can you show me some of those techniques? Orochimaru always said Jiraiya made a massive fool of himself all the time, but then again I swear he had the sex drive of a piece of roadkill."

Naruto blushed a bit. "Are you sure? I don't even remember all that much, and it's been a while anyway, and I wasn't very good at it at the time..."

"Stop back-pedalling like that." Sasuke poked him again. "Unless you can't do it, because you're too scared."

Naruto wasn't about to let that stand. "Well, you're really asking for it now!"

He tried to dredge up Jiraiya's advice. "So first, he had these ideas about how to start conversations with women he liked, but obviously we're already talking." To buy time, he emptied and refilled his cup. The bottle was half empty already; he hadn't noticed how fast they were drinking.

"Alright... I've got this..." Naruto said. He was sprawled confidently across most of the couch, now, and leaning towards Sasuke. His voice was a bit lower than usual as he asked "So, how do you want to do this?"

"Do what?"

He wrapped an arm around Sasuke's shoulders and pulled him closer, whispering in his ear. "Well, I'm not sure if you want me to be a gentleman or a rogue."

"Rogue, of course!"

"Ah, shit, I can't remember how this next bit goes. All the women he talked with were so much less forward."

Naruto poured out another pair of drinks as he thought. "Bottoms up." And with that, he downed his own drink, feeling a fire building in his throat and stomach. And elsewhere.

"Just be forward too, then, surely?" Sasuke said.

"Well, my T-shirt's a bit sticky anyway," Naruto bantered. "Besides, I'm pretty sure I'm more muscular than you."

He pulled it off in one smooth motion, then flexed over-dramatically in Sasuke's face.

"You've got bigger muscles," he agreed. "Then again, that's only fair, seeing as I'm so much more handsome than you."

"I think the word you're looking for isn't handsome, it's pretty!" Naruto said, laughing.

"Someone certainly thinks so," Sasuke said quietly. He pointed at Naruto's crotch; more specifically, he pointed at the bulge there.

"That's entirely biological!" Naruto said defensively. "It happens all the time when I'm drunk. Anyway, it's the pot calling the kettle black. Look at yourself."

Sasuke flushed as he noticed that his own growing excitement was also visible. "That's a coincidence."

His voice was quite hesitant on that last part, Naruto thought. He'd wondered, sometimes, about Sasuke, and now he wanted to find out.

He slowly, gently leaned forward, giving Sasuke enough time to stop him if he wanted to. And he kissed him.

Their faces awkwardly bumped together, and Naruto's nose ended up near Sasuke's eye, but on the whole he found he rather enjoyed it. Sasuke pulled back after a second, staring at him.

And smirked. "That was better than that time in the Academy, at least. And the wine tastes even better this way."

"So what do we do now?" Naruto asked nervously.

Sasuke looked at him with hooded eyes. "I reckon we can come up with _something_ , don't you agree?" He reached out with a cautious hand, stroking along the side of Naruto's neck.

Naruto leaned into the touch, surprised at how bearable the heat was when it came from another person instead of the unforgiving desert sun. And then he returned Sasuke's gesture, roughly running his hands through thick black hair. It was surprisingly silky, almost as if...

"Sasuke, how many products do you use on your hair?" Naruto teased. Sasuke looked him in the eyes for a moment, expression deadly serious.

After a short pause where Naruto stopped moving, he spoke. "You're better off using that mouth for something else." There was an undertone to his voice – something dark and wild – that Naruto responded to on a deep and primal level.

Naruto kissed him again. How could he not, after a statement like that? It was better the second time; there was much less awkward fumbling, for a start. Sasuke's chest was warm and hard against his own, and he stroked the firm pectorals. Sasuke responded by slipping some tongue into their shared kiss.

They stayed under until they ran out of air, at which point Naruto hugged Sasuke to him. His voice was rough with need. "I want you." Sasuke seemed at least as enthusiastic, Naruto mused, judging by his reaction.

* * *

A/N: Things get kinda explicit after here, which isn't allowed on . The full version of Flame is on ArchiveOfOurOwn dot org, under the same writer and fic name; there's a bit of smut and not much else missing on this one. This is the first slash I've ever tried to write - please let me know what you liked and disliked.


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